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Young readers, from those
who are just learning to read on their own to those with more-advanced reading
skills, have plenty of books that can help them understand the world around
them in accurate but still entertaining ways. The excellent “Scientists in the
Field” series skews toward older children and a comparatively straightforward
approach to narrative – and its looks at the everyday lives of real-world
scientists are invariably fascinating. Pamela S. Turner’s The Dolphins of Shark Bay, originally published in 2013 and now
available in paperback, is about the only known tool-using dolphins on Earth.
These marine mammals find and tear off sponges, use them to uncover edible
fish, drop the sponges to eat the fish, remember where they dropped the sponges
so they can go back and get them again, and then repeat the process. These
dolphins live in the waters off Australia and have been studied for more than
25 years by a research team led by Janet Mann, whose work is at the center of
the book. The interaction between humans (scientists or not) and dolphins is
unpredictable. For example, at one point Mann discovered that humans were
unwittingly raising infant mortality rates among a group of dolphins, at a
place called Monkey Mia, by feeding them: dolphin mothers who took food from
people learned to beg from beachgoers and boaters, but did not spend enough
time nursing their calves or protecting them from sharks. As a result, the
calves had a high mortality rate: “Monkey Mia’s baby dolphins starved in a stew
of good intentions.” Yet this book is scarcely a generalized condemnation of
human behavior toward dolphins; it is more nuanced than that. Still, it shows
again and again just how delicate – and amazing – the balance of nature can be.
Scott Tuason’s photographs bring the scientific research to life in truly
remarkable ways: a dolphin leaps high out of the water, possibly to dislodge an
irritating lamprey or possibly just for fun; a shark makes a meal of a dugong
carcass; a newborn dolphin calf pops above water to breathe; a dolphin
hydroplanes in the shallows to catch a fish; another holds a trumpet shell out
of the water and shakes it. These and other photos, along with Turner’s
narrative, never quite answer a question posed early in the book: why are dolphins intelligent? This is a
query with profound implications – after all, sharks have small brains, as
Turner points out, but are extremely successful in evolutionary terms. Brain
power is only one survival strategy – one to which we humans gravitate, since
we share it, but not necessarily the “best” in any significant way. Turner ends
the book with a discussion of whether dolphins can be said to have culture, and
what “having culture” really means. There is no answer here – whether the query
is even answerable is a matter of opinion – but this is the sort of
thoughtfulness that can get young readers interested in these scientists in
particular and in science in general. After all, as Mann remarks, “The
dolphins’ interactions with each other are far richer, more complex, and more
interesting than any interactions they have with us.”

Shorter, simpler,
illustration-heavy books for much younger readers – as young as kindergartners
– are invariably less thought-provoking, but can provide a good basis for kids
to read more-complex works later as they become more interested in the world we
live in. Two new Scholastic “Level 2 Readers” are good examples of this form of
real-world learning.Snakes by nature photographer Nic
Bishop, a simplification of his book of the same title from 2012, features
Bishop’s wonderfulclose-up pictures of
snakes’ appearances and activities. From an astonishing view of an egg-eating
snake swallowing a meal four times the size of its head, to a hognose snake
pretending to be dead to fool predators, to a beautiful close view of an infant
Honduran milk snake emerging from its egg, Bishop captures snakes’ colors and
distinguishing characteristics with a precision that would make any
herpetologist (a scientist who studies snakes) proud. But his narrative is not
equal to his photography. The first three words in the book are “snakes are
scary,” which is not a good way to introduce young children to fascinating
animals with which they may be unfamiliar. And Bishop shows a disproportionate
number of venomous snakes, presumably because so many have such striking
appearances – even though only about 11% of all snake species are venomous, and
few of those have venom strong enough to harm humans.Bishop’s Level 2 Snakes, like the longer version on which it is based, is lovely to
look at as an example of gorgeous photography of fascinating animals. But its
spare text, while it provides very basic information on snakes in an
age-appropriate way, is best seen as a doorway through which young readers can
go on their way to get more-detailed, more-balanced information elsewhere.

Tedd Arnold’s Fly Guy Presents: Weather is at the same
reading level, and like other entries in the Fly Guy Presents series, will be particularly enjoyable for kids
who are already fans of the fictional adventures of Fly Guy and his boy, Buzz. The
book is narrated by Buzz, with occasional comments from Fly Guy but, more
often, with Fly Guy being used as visual comic relief – for instance, when Buzz
explains that weather originates in outer space, Fly Guy is seen flying about
in a space suit, and when Buzz mentions that cumulus clouds look like cotton
candy, Fly Guy is hovering nearby eating cotton candy. There is good basic
information here on how weather happens, and some material that young readers
will likely find especially interesting, such as the fact that a rainbow’s
colors always appear in the same order (Arnold shows what they are but does not
give the “Roy G. Biv” acronym). Fly Guy is amusing in a rain slicker and a snow
suit; Buzz’s drawing of a pinwheel to illustrate the shape of a hurricane as
seen from space is a useful visual aid; and the explanation of Earth’s four
basic climates (desert, polar, temperate and tropical) is nicely done and
readily understandable. In fact, adults may appreciate some of the simple,
straightforward explanations here, which are not often provided in standard
weather reports: “A hurricane forms when a group of thunderstorms spins over
warm oceans. As this group of storms becomes stronger, winds rush to its
center. This causes the entire group to spin, forming one massive storm.” The
basics of the water cycle are also well explained and clearly illustrated. Fly Guy Presents: Weather is a good
example of how skillful writing and attractive illustrations – including lots
of photos, plus the drawings of Buzz and Fly Guy – can combine to provide early
readers with a solid introduction to science in a way that will encourage them
to continue learning as time goes on.